Tag Archives: Abound Solar

Abound Solar of Longmont, Colorado recently announced the laying off of 70% of it’s workforce and delayed/cancelled plans for a new plant in Indiana. Just like the Solyndra Solar Panel company failure and other green energy schemes designed to be Democratic donor pocket-stuffers, Abound received hundreds of millions of dollars in Steven Chu-approved DOE green energy loans from the U.S. taxpayer. $400 million dollars to be exact. And just like Solyndra, this is a taxpayer-funded failure designed by another Democratic big government grifter, Mr. Pat Stryker, the founder of Bohemian Companies. ( an Abound investor)

The Denver Post, while reporting about Abound’s recent announcement of laying off 70% of it’s workforce, and pointing towards another $400 million dollar loss that will be shoved down the taxpayers throats, forgot/refused/was incapable of that type of truth-telling about it being a big Obama bundler-financier behind the Abound green energy failure. The Denver Post did make the effort to publish all of the very same lame, tired excuses ( as we heard from Solyndra) on why this green energy company failed:

The price for solar panels has collapsed — dropping almost 60 percent to $1.10 a watt between 2009 and 2011, according to industry consultant Solarbuzz.The decline was caused by Chinese manufacturers, backed by low-cost government loans, ramping up production, Abely said.

The Abound green energy company, according to one of the thousands of taxpayer-funded campaign speeches by Barack Hussein Obama, was supposed to “create whole new industries and hundreds of thousands of new jobs in America.” However, fourteen months later the company is bleeding financially, laying off hundreds of workers, shutting down production to retool, and complaining that it is all China’s fault. This scenario also fits the [Solyndra] pattern of Abound laying off it’s main production force due to being insolvent, yet staying in business to “retool.”

Solyndra paid it’s remaining employees huge bonuses after they went belly up, saying they had to do it to keep “valued” employees. Keeping “Valued employees” at a bankrupt green energy plant? For what? Obama’s reelection campaign? Or for another feeding frenzy at the taxpayer cash trough as soon as Obama and company can sneak it by the media? They are not producing a profitable product, yet stay in business. Only in big government la-la-land, where tax dollars are free for the taking for Obama-supporters does that happen. While paying out those bonuses (at taxpayer expense) at the Solyndra plant, those same “valued employees” were caught smashing millions of dollars in special materials and class used to make solar panels and throwing it into the dumpster. See those valued employees in action burning the taxpayer, complete with video here.

Bob Beauprez over at Townhall did the real legwork here, in showing just who the Abound investor Mr. Stryker is:

So, how did Abound convince the Obama Administration to approve a $400 million loan? Just as Solyndra and other companies that received millions and billions for green projects were connected to campaign contributors and administration officials, one of the main investors in Abound – Pat Stryker – is a big Democrat financier. The following is courtesy of Joel Gehrke and the Washington Examiner. What Gehrke failed to mention is that billionaire Stryker is also a founding member of the “Gang of Four” who invested millions in what became known as the Colorado Model, a largely covert political strategy that reversed the political power in Colorado and became embraced by the Democrat Party.

“Pat Stryker, founder of Bohemian Companies (an Abound Solar investor, as the Sunlight Foundation first observed), donated $50,000 to support President Obama’s 2009 inauguration and bundled another $87,500 for the event, Stryker also gave $35,500 to the Obama Victory Fund 2012, according to FEC reports, and another $5000 to the Democratic White House Victory Fund in 2008.”

“For instance, FEC reports show Stryker donated $145,000 in 2010 to America’s Families First Action Fund (AFFAF) and $75,000 to ‘Women Vote’ operation organized by the pro-choice group, Emily’s List. the Washington Post reported in October 2010 that AFFAF had spent almost $6 million during that cycle on behalf of Democratic candidates only.‘Women Vote’ is a similarly partisan effort by Emily’s List to ‘turn out women voters for our pro-choice Democratic women candidates and every Democrat on the ticket.’

Are Americans really going to vote for four more years of these types of blatant big government graft and taxpayer abuse at the hand of Barack Obama and his appointed minions in the DOE ?